A Little Love Oddity
by multiplied
Summary: I like you. Harry has been caught off gaurd by these three words. I like you. What will Harry do? R
1. I Like You

**The starting of this comes from inspiration from "I like you" by Fluffysmarts! Thanks so much! ******

Harry Potter walked heavily back to the Gryffindor Common Room, coming back from one of the dullest meetings known to wizard-kind. A meeting about his future career options. A meeting about his future career options with Professor Bins. That should explain everything. His classes were boring but this… that… that was torture . Five hours and a man could go crazy.

"Hi Harry."

"Hey Luna."

"Coming back from a career meeting?"

"Yeah- how'd you kn—" Harry had long ago learned not to ask these questions to Luna anymore. He honestly really didn't want to know how she knew.

Luna smiled with a blank look aimed for the ceiling.

"Nevermind, Luna." Harry said, in the least offensive manner possible.

"I like you."

"What?" Harry asked distractedly.

"I like you." Luna repeated still staring up at the ceiling with that blank look on her face as they walked side by side.

"What…?" Harry's head snapped to Luna. Luna was unaware, examining the bricks in the floor.

"I like you." She repeated patiently for the third time.

"Like as in… friend-like?" Harry asked for clarification.

"Nope."

"Oh."

"Like as in like-like." Luna clarified with a smile, big innocent blue eyes turning to Harry.

"I like you." She repeated, answering Harry's confused look.

"Oh..."

"See you, Harry." Luna veered off to the left, going down a separate corridor, little bells jangling on her purple belt.

"See you..." Harry managed.

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"YOU SAID _WHAT_?"

"Nothing."

"EXACTLY!" Hermione yelled, "She said she _liked_ you and you said _nothing_?!"

"I said 'oh' actually."

"Oh, well that makes everything _loads_ better!" Hermione said sarcastically, hovering around Harry in his armchair like a vulture. A vulture that was about to kill him and _then_ pick at his bones.

"Well what was I _supposed_ to say?"

"_Anything_! The truth would have been nice, too!"

"Well I can see that going down much better. 'Oh, sorry but I think you're a wacko, Luna. I don't like you like that, sorry.' With my luck I would have ended up in the hospital wing. You've seen what she can do with that wand!"

"Don't be ridiculous, Harry! Plus, you won't say it like that and you know it! Luna's not a _wacko_ and she certainly wouldn't have hurt you! She's a nice girl just a little…" Hermione for once seemed to be at a loss for words.

"_See_?"

"I was just going to say she was a little strange but other than that she's perfectly fine! A little oddity never killed anyone!"

"Oh, please Hermione. I don't think even Neville would go out with her."

"HARRY!"

"Hermione, you know it's true."

That was it, Hermione was fuming. _How could he think something like that about anyone!_

"You probably hurt her feelings! Think of how _she _feels! Getting up all that courage just to have you say 'oh'!"

"What was I supposed to say!" Harry argued once more, "She jumped me in the hallway! You can't just think of something nice on the spot like that! Especially when she's giving you that look… you know, the crazy Luna-look."

"Oh, please Harry! This is ridiculous!"

"Think about how _I _feel!"

"Can you possibly think of anyone _besides_ yourself for once!" Hermione stormed out of the Common Room, pushing even the smallest of first-years out of her way.


	2. A Breakfast Brawl

"Mate, she's not talking to me, this is absolutely ridiculous."

"Why"-mmm-"was this, again?" Ron asked in between shoving bits of bacon into his mouth.

"She crazy that one." Harry continued, "We knew it from the beginning. Remember first-year?"

"Ummhumm." Ron swallowed, "But what is this all about?"

It was then that Harry saw Luna enter the hall. His eyes were temporarily glued to her.

"Um, Hello Ronald." She said as se passed by but only watching Harry with that intent Luna-stare, "Hi Harry." She added, as if she were completely oblivious to how Harry had been avoiding her at all costs during that past two days, after all, she was Luna.

"Ah."

"You see?"

"I see." It was all pretty self-explanatory.

Hermione plopped herself down at the table right next to Harry. Although Hermione was refusing to talk to Harry, she continued to follow her usual schedule, which always included Harry. Only thing, she wouldn't talk to him.

"Heh-Hermihonieee." Ron said, voice muffled from a piece of biscuit he had oh-so-ceremoniously stuffed into his mouth. Ron received no answer but a look of disgust.

"Oh so you're not talking to Ron now either, are you?" Harry asked, slightly irritated.

No answer. Ron just shrugged, not exactly caring too much whether or not Hermione was talking to him or not when he had a towering plate of bacon, eggs, toast, watermelon and pancakes in front of him.

"Look, Hermione, you're being unreasonable," Harry paused, this wouldn't be the first time in his life Hermione was being completely unreasonable with either him or Ron, "What was I going to say? I was practically jumped."

Hermione started to work on the eggs that were set out in front of her, ignoring Harry.

"He has got a point, Hermione," Ron added to Harry's defense after swallowing a huge bite of egg, "I think anyone would have done the same. He was practically pounced on, that's hardly fair."

"Plus, I mean no offense but," Harry's voice quieted, "I don't think anyone would want to date Luna anyway—"

Hermione threw down her knife and fork glaring at the two boys, "You know what? I expected more of the both of you. She's a nice girl! But all you guys see, is how she's weird. You just see what you _want_ to see about her," Hermione was half-whispering-half-talking in a almost hysteric tone, "and that just speaks badly about the two of you! So you know what? Fine, she's weird but maybe if you even _tried_ to get to know her you might actually like her!"

Hermione shoved the bench out of her way, and once again, stormed out leaving both boys silent exchanging questioning looks.

"What was _that_ all about?"

"Don't ask me, I'm not the one who made her mad."

"Honestly, you boys can be _so_ thick." Lavander muttered, as she was sitting next to Ron and had heard the whole thing.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Harry asked suspiciously.

Lavander shrugged, returning to her breakfast.

**Hope you guys liked it! Another chapter coming up soon so keep reviewing!**


	3. Knarkmacks, Billywigs and Erklings

It had been a very strange situation within the past few days for Harry. After Hermione's little explosion at breakfast she had been avoiding him at all cost, almost as well as he had been avoiding Luna. Ron seemingly, remained oblivious to the whole situation, or if he was aware of anything he didn't go telling Harry about it. Whenever Harry _did_ by chance find Hermione, it seemed she had a Harry-radar and immediately disappeared from the face of the earth.

Harry found himself, once again searching for Hermione after dinner. It seemed she had either been skipping dinner all together or getting it down in the Kitchens. Knowing Hermione, and how she could never pass up a good pasta dinner, he figured she had been in the Kitchens.

Tickling the Pear, Harry entered the kitchens.

"Hi Harry."

Harry whipped around. Luna. She was sitting on one of the marble counters with a plate of undistinguishable lumps of something black on a plate.

"Umm, uh, well." Harry coughed, "Hi Luna." Harry found himself a deep shade of scarlet, despite the fact that he didn't actually _like_ Luna, at least not like that. It was more of the fact that he had been avoiding her, and she probably knew. For the first time, Harry hoped she was completely oblivious to the fact, as she usually was.

Luna brought Harry back into reality, "Bitten by a Knarkmack?"

"A what—"

"A Knarkmack." Luna clarified. It seemed Luna was doing a lot of clarifying for Harry lately.

"A Knarkmack?" Harry asked, then quickly realized he most likely didn't want to know.

"You know, they make you go all red and stuff when you're embarrassed," Luna explained with a little wonky smile with a look that clearly read 'how-can-you-not-know-about-Knarkmacks?', "A Knarkmack." She repeated for Harry's sake.

"Oh." Was that really all he could say lately?

"You really should be updating on your Quibbler, Harry," Luna said, her big blue eyes fixed on Harry, "There was a column in last week's about Knarkmacks. Interesting creatures, actually. My dad did some research on them last year, I read some of the files. I think Mr. McKinley wrote that article though… he went to Africa last week, big Knarkmack epidemic…"

"Oh."

Luna stuffed one of the black lumps into her mouth, still unaware of Harry's clear awkwardness, "Want one?" Luna asked, offering the plate to Harry, for he had been looking at the plate with a strange look ever since he entered.

Harry looked at the black lumps questionably and rightly so.

"Fried Billywig droppings," Luna explained taking a crunchy bite out of one; Harry cringed, it didn't sound or look all too appetizing.

"No thanks."

"Actually I think there was an article about Billywigs, last issue too." Luna put down the plate and resumed staring intently at Harry, "Pretty annoying things if you ask me. Always buzzing around you when you go to swamps."

"Oh." Did Luna realize how unnerving her stares were? Luna took another crunch out of her fried Billywig dropping, Harry suppressed a twitch.

"The elves down here are really nice, you know Harry?" Luna continued, "They'll make you up anything. A good Fried Billywig droppings isn't too common around here but they made it pretty well."

"Have you seen Hermione around?" Harry asked, doing his best to avoid Luna's stare without seeming too rude.

Luna didn't seem the least bit troubled, "She came in here a while ago… Can't remember where she said she was going… She liked the Billywig droppings, you should really try some Harry." Harry sighed and Luna quickly added, "But she did say she had to study for something."

"Thanks Luna."

"You really should try one though, Harry." Luna once again offered the plate of Billywig droppings.

"No thanks, I'm okay." Harry said, trying to manage a smile, "I'll see you around Luna."

"Bye. Make sure you don't run into any Erklings though."

Harry didn't even want to know what that meant.

**Hope you enjoyed the chapter and Luna's Loony-ness :) Please keep reviewing!**


	4. State the Obvious

Escaping from the kitchens Harry thought of all the places he might find Hermione. He didn't know exactly why he needed to find her, he just knew that he had to. It was like an instinct, I mean, Hermione was always around and it was a little too weird not having her around. Something just seemed a little… _off_.

Don't get me wrong, they had loads of fights like this, where one would be avoiding the other for some reason or another but this was different. Their fights had always been about petty stuff; homework-copying, squabbles, Scabbers getting into Crookshanks's cat treats, whether or not Harry had sent a recent letter to 'Snuffles' ect. But this was Hermione being mad about something that wasn't even, well, related to her. For god's sake, Hermione didn't even like Luna all that much but she immediately jumped to her defense. Something just seemed a little too weird for Hermione to be getting worked up over somebody she didn't even really like in the first place and it wasn't exactly like Hermione to be getting all sentimental over Harry's issues involving other girls.

Maybe Harry wasn't as thick as Lavender thought, after all.

"Neville, you seen Hermione?"

"Yeah," Neville looked a little nervous, but that wasn't anything out of the ordinary, "She was up in the Library…"

"Thanks, Nev."

"Harry?" Harry turned around, Neville was wringing his hands.

"Yeah?"

"Just don't… J-just don't," Neville wouldn't meet Harry's inquisitive look, "Just d-don't hurt her is all I mean to say." Neville finally blurted out and quickly scurried away down the hall.

What was that supposed to mean?

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Harry finally found Hermione in the Library. As usual, she was hunched over a big book, bushy hair hanging over her face. Even though Harry couldn't see her face, he had a pretty good idea of how it was going to be when she saw him.

"'Mione?" Hermione looked up, surprise written all over her face. Her cheeks were red and wet, which troubled Harry slightly.

"Go away, Harry." Hermione said quickly covering up her face with a baggy sleeve, protecting it from Harry's uneasy stare. Her voice didn't sound right either, which only added to Harry's worry. To Hermione's distress, Harry only drew closer.

"Seriously, Harry, go. I'm really not in the mood."

"Hermione…"

"Go, Harry, please."

"This isn't about Luna," Hermione turned away, only wanting to hide herself more, "is it?"

"Harry," Hermione mumbled from behind her sleeve after a long silence, "seriously, I don't want to talk about it."

"You don't even like, Luna…" It was pretty obvious Hermione wanted to disappear, "So why would you defend her like that?"

"You're so thick, Harry." Hermione managed to pull her sleeve away from her face and meet Harry's gaze, "Can't you see? Are you seriously _that _blind? Even Ron can see it. Hell, even Lavender knows it." Hermione sounded, in between sniffs, frustrated, even angry.

Harry just stood there, limply. For the first time, he didn't say anything; he didn't even dare to say 'oh'. Hermione didn't seem to care anymore.

"Harry, I like you." The tears that had been welling up in Hermione's brown eyes seemed to be leaking out slowly, one by one, "Hell, while I'm at it I may as well say that I may even love you."

After an excruciatingly long silence, Harry unglued himself from his temporary state of shock, "'Mione…" Harry quickly moved forward taking the shaking figure of Hermione in his arms, which was probably the smart thing to do.

"Harry," Hermione whispered in between sobs, "please… don't… please don't, Harry."

"Please don't what?" Harry asked softly, gently stroking her back.

"Don't break my heart."

Brown eyes met green ones. Pale lips met wet pink ones.

"Talk about stating the obvious…" Hermione half laughed, tears still freely falling.

**Yeah. Please don't kill me. I hope you liked it. Final Chapter coming next!**


	5. An Empty Plate

It was pretty obvious what Harry had to do, what the right thing to do was. The only question was:_ how_? This wasn't exactly the most comfortable of situations… especially with Luna, who wasn't exactly the most relaxing person in Hogwarts.

It was after dinner and Harry knew where she would be.

"Good evening sir," said a small squeaky house-elf the minute he entered the kitchens, "How may I be of service?"

"Er…" Harry started, slightly unnerved by the house-elf's big shiny gaze, "Have you, um, seen a girl in here?"

"Tall and blonde, sir?" The houses-elf asked. Harry's face lit up.

"Yeah—"

"With big blue eyes, like this, sir?" The house-elf pointed to his, opening them a little wider making them look like two saucers. It did in fact, resemble Luna's to come degree.

"Well, yes—"

"And a kind of smile like this, sir?" The house-elf simulated one of Luna's wonky, crazy smiles quite well.

"Uh, yeah, I gue—"

"And big dragon teeth earrings, sir?" Sure sounded like Luna to Harry.

"I think so—"

"Haven't seen her, sir." The house-elf finally concluded lamentably with a slightly dissatisfied smile, "Why might you be looking for her, sir?"

"Well, actually I have to well—" What exactly did he have to tell her? "Well, no reason, really." Harry said a little disappointed. Harry took a seat on a counter, the counter where Luna had offered him the fried Billywig droppings.

"Any other way I might be of assistance, sir?"

"Actually, could you make me some… fried Billywig droppings?" Harry asked, slightly surprised he was asking for them.

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"Billywig droppings?" Harry looked up from the counter to see Luna standing in front of him, a silly grin spreading from dragon tooth earring to dragon tooth earring; the kind of grin only Luna could make.

"Oh," Harry's face reddened a bit, despite having decided he wouldn't be embarrassed, "Well, yeah."

"Good right?"

"Suprisingly." Luna didn't take offense, Harry didn't expect her to.

"Do you like kids, Harry?" Luna asked randomly, hauling herself up onto the counter next to Harry and taking a black lump of Billywig dropping off of his plate and popping it into her mouth.

"Uh, well, I suppose."

"Good, because I like kids, too." Luna seemed like she had reached a conclusion, Harry looked at her, puzzled.

"I'm glad." He guessed; after all, this was Luna.

"I was thinking we could name our first daughter Melinda."

"Oh?" There it was again, the dreaded 'oh'. He had sworn to himself he would never say 'oh' again. But there it was. The 'oh'.

"Yeah," Luna crossed her long legs on the counter top, "We'll send her to play that muggle sport called… Soccer? Right?" Harry nodded despite himself, "But that's after we have Scylla."

"Scylla?"

"She'll be our second," Luna said nodding, "She'll be the smart one in the family. She'll have black hair like yours because she'll be her father's daughter, daring and bold." Somehow Harry didn't find this as strange as you might think, Harry knew he had to stop her, he couldn't let her keep believing in her fairy tales; these were the kind of fairy tales that everyone lived happily ever after in, but Harry couldn't let it happen.

"Luna…"

"I know, Scylla is a very inauspicious name for girl but my _Insights to the Future_ book told me it would be okay, especially because she'll be born in December—"

"Luna…" The harder Harry tried the harder it seemed.

"but we could also name her Clytia, which is actually a very luck name according to—"

"Luna," Harry finally stopped her, catching her thoughts on the shoulder. Luna looked at him with that big smile of hers and big blue eyes. A world full of hope. It seemed almost impossible to break that for her.

"Luna," Harry needed to repeat it for himself, "We- I mean, _I_ can't do this."

There. He said it.

"Oh." Somehow it seemed less agonizing when he was the one saying it.

"I'm really sorry Luna…" Harry couldn't watch that Luna grin slowly fade off her face, "I'm really sorry, I'm really sorry if I, well, _lead_… you on." He knew that's exactly what he had done, but he couldn't admit to it. He couldn't admit it to himself. He knew he had made a mistake when he hadn't said anything but 'oh'.

"So… no Melinda?"

Harry shook his head painfully, "No… At least not now." He knew it wasn't right to leave her with hope like that, but it was easier for him.

"Are you sure, Harry?" Was he sure? Or was that what she really was asking?

"Yeah."

"Oh." Harry stopped himself from shrinking, he could hear her disappointment. Harry heard Luna uncross her legs, drop from off the counter drop off and pause.

"At least I can say I tried." Harry forced himself to look up. Luna had a silly half smile, but quite different from the last one. This one was full of disappointment.

Luna left, the tiny bells on her purple belt jingling, leaving Harry on the counter with an empty plate where the fried Billywig droppings were.

LE FIN

**I hope you all enjoyed the story. It was SO hard to finish. I really didn't want to like… hurt Luna. It made me all funky and emotional. Hahaha. If you like, you should download the song "I Love You" by Sarah McLachlan which I was listening to when I wrote the end. So, well, I hope you liked it is all I really wanted to say. Please review my other stories!**


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